De Luce et Tenebris Umbra

Nova Initia
New Beginnings

If you're in a fair fight, you didn't plan it properly.
-- Nick Lappos, Chief R&D Pilot, Sikorsky Aircraft.

“Wake up Ghost! Wake up! It’s just a dream!”

I open my eyes, and am not surprised to see the face of my second in command Alex Rent (Call-Sign “Pick”) Nickname “Toothpick” after that habit of his to always have one of them sticking out of his mouth between missions.

“Welcome back to reality,” he sighed. “Had to make some Black Ops threats to keep the crew from coming to see what was goin’ on. You gave me and the rest of the team a bit of a scare, hearin’ you hollerin’ like that,” he continued with a worried expression.

“I’m fine,” I say slowly getting up, my shirt is soaked with sweat, “Just a dream.” The bulkhead next to my bunk is dented in several places from several past ‘Dreams’.

Alex shook his head slowly, “If this shit keeps on happenin’ then we won’t be able to stop the medics from forcin’ you into a check up.”

I sigh and reach for the canteen that I keep on my locker. Taking a swig, I swish and spit into a nearby sink, seeing a bit o’ blood, I realize that I had bit my cheek. I turn away from Alex and reach up to the laceration, healing it with a quick thought. No one knows what I can do, and I intend to keep it that way.

“Man, ya’ need ta’ stop be’n so stubborn all the time.” Alex sighs, finding a corner chair, “One of these time you’re gonna have to open up to someone, about these ‘Dreams’ else they’re gonna take ya’ off the roster. They’ll probably chalk it up to all these HSBEL assignments.”

I chuckle lightly, “They won’t, I’m too good to bench.” Then I reconsider, “Actually, they might considering we have the upper hand in the war now.” I start to chew on my newly healed cheek and say jokingly, “Next assignment we get I’m askin’ for separate rooms, and soundproofing.”

“Yer mad, is what you are,” Alex smiles shaking his head, holding his face in his hands. “Well,” he grunts getting up from the chair, “As long as it don’t get you killed then its okay, to a…” There’s surprise on his face as he stares past me, but the only thing behind me is the sink and my locker… Shit, it’s still open, exposing my wooden carvings of the beings in my nightmares.

He was about to say something when the terminal on the other side of the room gave a sharp trill. I took the opportunity to slam the locker shut, sealing it. Alex gave me a weird look and I just shook my head mouthing, “Another time,” as the message began to play.

As it turns out, it wasn’t a prerecorded message, but rather a call from the bridge, from the third member of my team Dan (Call-Sign Maverick) Nickname “Tortoise”, used to be Turtle, but he wanted Tortoise.

“Ghost, we got a…” he paused when he saw Alex and gave him a look that said, “Another one?” Alex just nodded and gestured for him to continue.

“Anyway… we got a new set of orders from command and apparently my codes aren’t qualified to get into the file, so you guys need to get down here to the bridge fast as you can,” Dan continued with a slightly confused face.

Alex stared openmouthed at this statement, and I sat there trying to contemplate how highly classified these orders were to not accept the primary clearance orders of our communications officer. I was the only other person on the ship that had clearance equal to his, and then some, so hopefully they open to mine. Then again, there were other ways that he could get into the file.

“Did you try…” I started before Dan interrupted me.

“Yes, I did, not even those.”

Now, that had me stunned. Either command had caught wind of Dan’s unorthodox ways of getting into encrypted files, or they needed a full biometrics scan from the two, to maybe three, individuals on the ship with the highest security clearance. Which would be me, Dan, and Alex.

“Well fuck. Looks like we aren’t getting a break anytime soon,” I sighed. Alex glanced at me and started to say something, but I cut him off. “I said I’ll explain it later, for now let’s just get this over with.”

The quick march to the bridge was uneventful except for a few sidelong glances that I got from the crew. They would travel with us to the gates of hell, but these recent reoccurring “dreams” were starting to trouble them. Some of the crew were new, and would probably take the first chance that they got to get back at me. I’ve been cracking down on their heads and war monger attitudes since they arrived. Their Special Forces “I’m a Badass” attitudes had to be put in their place.

Meeting up with the others at the bridge, we stood in front of the terminal, speaking our respective clearances, ranks, serial numbers, the whole 9 yds.

*Beep*

A small window popped up with the words:

MESSAGE PRIORITY LEVEL ROMEO-WHISKEY.

I heard running behind me as the rest of the crew that were present rushed out of the room. The consequences for someone that was not cleared to observe one of these messages were, ‘Severe’.

Alex rubbed his hands together with a maniac smile on his face.

“Well then, let’s get started shall we?” he said with his maniac excitement as he opened the file.

*URGENT MESSAGE INCOMING*

CLASSIFICATION X-RAY ZULU 0-2-1-2

RECOMMENDED CAUTION LEVEL--- ROMEO<>WHISKEY

There has been an incident at Research Facility Theta in the Epsilon Eridani system.
The lead scientist (Call-Sign Wide-Eyes) has disappeared in an experimental trial to observe a classified anomaly (Call-Sign LDorm), and is missing; presumed captured.

X-RAY ALPHA and X-RAY BRAVO squads are being dispatched to investigate this anomaly and observe the surrounding area for Renton Van activity. (Suspected Involvement)

X-RAY ALPHA will determine the location and status of LSci.-Wide-Eyes.

XA-Lead (Ghost) Will make the call either to retrieve or sterilize the package to prevent the spread of possibly lethal ‘contaminants’.

X-RAY BRAVO Will secure the facility and await further orders from XA-Lead.

RESEARCH FACILITY THETA

Facility spans 1 X 1.5 km

Border fences and guard towers are present.

1 Barracks

1 Main Research Lab

1 Vehicle Depot

1 Main Recreational Facility

3 Landing Pads

Occupants

25 Researchers

35 Combat/Defense Personnel

Technicals

2 Medium Class Light Transport Vehicles

1 Medium Class Armored Personnel Carrier (AAIPC)

1 Light VTOL Transport Aircraft

NOTE:

As per recent events caution is also placed as the facilities distress call may be false in an attempt to eliminate more of our special forces. You are our very best; Ladies and Gentlemen; we can’t afford to lose you.

Be Careful…

Good Luck.

At 0425 all reports must be sent to Intel Prowler (Call-Sign “Black Cat”)

CURRENT TIME: 0330

SLIPSPACE JUMP: 0430

MISSION START: 0600

*END TRANSMISSION*

We had about 1 hour to type out our reports and send them through an encrypted channel to our intelligence ship. Then we were to immediately go dark and com silent until we reached we reached the research facility on Cherok IV. It was named after General Alfred Cherok who successfully stopped the Renton Van advance but lost his life and his ship as he forced his crew to abandon ship. He became renowned for this act as it led to the Van’s retreat and allowed us to tear their Frontal Invasion Lines to pieces. In his honor the nearest life sustaining planet was rechristened from XZ-212 to Cherok IV.

Moving to one of the two main briefing rooms, I met up with rest of my team. I stood outside of the door and tried to think of what I would say. Looking to my right I could see the other briefing room’s door. Rex, X-RAY Bravo’s squad lead was also standing outside only he was looking at me with an expectant look as the rest of Bravo walked into the room. I just shook my head slowly and sadly. I had promised both teams R&R when we got back from our last mission. I had even pulled most of my favors to get all missions passed off to the somewhat experienced Charlie and Delta teams, they’d been stuck on backwater cleanup with the occasional ‘Van encounter, and were starting to get restless. To bypass everything I had called in especially a few major ‘secrets’ meant that this was a special case, and that we hadn’t been given all the information.

Rex walked into his room, with his shoulders hanging tiredly. His team had taken the brunt of the last mission. Luckily there had been no casualties, but his second had been hit pretty hard. Again I had called in favors to get her the best medical treatment possible. She should have died from her wounds on the dillo’s ride back, but I had a say in who’d been at her side enroute. I had personally kicked Death out the gangplank before he had even gotten in.

Rex was getting too close to her, and I couldn’t let Alpha’s backup fall behind. I couldn’t really blame him for doing it. The end to the war was in sight, and they’d spent all of boot and most of their service together. But it’s always on the home-stretch, with the finish-line just in your grasp, that something will come to trip you up.

I rolled my shoulders before I entered the room, and popped my neck before striding towards the wall monitor. Everyone just sat in their respective chairs, and corners, as I explained why their leave for next god knows how long had been canceled once again.

Our target was a field research scientist call-sign “Wide-Eyes” that had been deployed to study the recent increase in Electromagnetic activity in this area. Only his extensive research into this anomaly, led to an experiment that brought him near an inter-dimensional rift. That most of us call a “Wild Dormy” because of their unpredictable nature. The other researchers claimed that during the experiment, Wide-Eyes claimed to have seen a visual shift in the size of the dormy, along with a sight of something moving from the other dimension through the rift. Apparently he thought that he should get a closer look at this anomaly, but the localized EM field was preventing any visual recording equipment from recording a decent picture or video. Any equipment that came within 15 meters was rendered useless. No matter what was tried all that came out was a grainy or extremely pixilated image of the anomaly. So Wide-Eyes attempted to get close enough to attain a decent view of what was on the other side.

There was an audio recording from one of his assistants, “H…he just w…walked closer to it and t...tried to get a p...peek through, but then he shouted out a..and th..this arm came out of nowhere and grabbed him!” “We were all sc...scared and d...didn’t want to get close to it.” After this he broke down and started sputtering something along the lines of, “Sh…should’ve helped him… some…somehow.”

Another assistant continued for him, “We were all sorta expecting him to come back smiling with the thing on a leash, ready to publish another theory for interdimensional travel. But then things thing with bright yellow eyes started staring at us through the rift and tried to get through, so we shut it all down, and are now filing this report.”

By the end of the briefing I had gotten some curious glances at what this mission briefing entailed.
“Interdimensional Search&Rescue sir? Isn’t that a bit out of our forte?” spoke Dan with an innocent look on his face.

I rubbed my eyes as Alex face-palmed.

“Yes, Dan. We have no info on the latter of our mission.” I said with a slightly creepy smile. “We have absolutely no idea what we’ll be facing in the ‘Twilight Zone,’ but if worse comes to worse we can feed you to whatever’s there, I’m sure you’ll taste just like chicken.’

I referred to his ancient collection of psychological animations, and his favorite phrase when trying to get us to eat his ‘Mystery Meat’ during an LS mission.

‘Come ooonnn. Just try it. I assure you, it tastes just like chicken.’

A possible ambush or alien species, we could handle. Eating more Mystery Stew? Not so much.